UPDATED: DxO Optics Pro Review Discussion Thread

DavidTO

DxO Optics Pro review is here.

Discuss.


UPDATED with a link to DxO Masters. These are people that really know what they're doing! :thumb

wxwax

Cool, I'm glad to see this review, David.

The thing that is attracting me to DxO is the lens distortion tool. I understand it's very good. Have you run any ultra-wide angle shots with leaning buildings/tress, through it?

I'm very curious to see how well it handles that, given my affection for short glass.

DavidTO

wxwax wrote:

Cool, I'm glad to see this review, David.

The thing that is attracting me to DxO is the lens distortion tool. I understand it's very good. Have you run any ultra-wide angle shots with leaning buildings/tress, through it?

I'm very curious to see how well it handles that, given my affection for short glass.

It is very good. The second shot I put in was shot at 10mm, but no, there's no buildings there. You can read more about the distortion corrections here.

Andy

Nice Job, Steve

DavidTO

Andy wrote:

Nice Job, Steve

Where's the smiley where you put your head in your hands and quietly shake your head in exasperation? I need that smiley....PATCH!

DavidTO

wxwax wrote:

Cool, I'm glad to see this review, David.

The thing that is attracting me to DxO is the lens distortion tool. I understand it's very good. Have you run any ultra-wide angle shots with leaning buildings/tress, through it?

I'm very curious to see how well it handles that, given my affection for short glass.

Sid,

Why don't you download the demo? It's good for 21 days...you can test it out to your heart's content.

When you buy it you buy access to all the modules available for the package that you've purchased---but you don't download all of them. You only download the ones that you need. I got the 20D, 50 1.8, 50 1.4, 10-22, 17-40, 70-200 and it was 32MB. I may go back and get the Rebel for my older shots, but I didn't do that yet. I can always go back and get the others...as long as they're included in the package I bought (I didn't get the elite version, so I couldn't get the 1 series modules, for instance...)

DavidTO

I also want to encourage anyone interested in it to post your before and after DxO here. I've played with the demo before, in v1, even. But I've just actually bought the application, and there's so much more to learn from it. Maybe you've played with the lighting controls and can teach the rest of us? Or even if you're a n00b like me, post some images so we can all see what you were able to get out of DxO.

Ric Grupe

Original thread here.
http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=27371

Nice work, DavidTO

DavidTO

Ric Grupe wrote:

http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=27371

Nice work, DavidTO

Cool. I forgot about that thread.

Ric Grupe

Niagara at dusk
From the tenth floor of the Sheridan. DxO should be obvious!:D



I should note, this was done to a JPEG......so don't think DxO is for RAW only.

DavidTO

Great example, Ric. That should satisfy wxwax!

DavidTO

Ric Grupe wrote:

I should note, this was done to a JPEG......so don't think DxO is for RAW only.

This is true, and although I mention it in my review, maybe I didn't make it obvious enough...you don't need to use it only on RAW!

Ric Grupe

DavidTO wrote:

This is true, and although I mention it in my review, maybe I didn't make it obvious enough...you don't need to use it only on RAW!

I guess your name is Steve....right?

I am very familiar with DxO, (been with it since it's inception) so I have to admit I didn't read your review. I just looked at the layout and examples. A little redundancy don't hurt!

I just tried the new Bibble with the PT Lens plugin, and I think DxO wins hands down. The "Perfectly Clear" part was very interesting though, because for people with digicams or people just wanting to do a quick fix on their snapshots it's terrific.

DavidTO

Ric Grupe wrote:

I guess your name is Steve....right?

No, that's Andy being "funny". Someone gave my avatar a mock turtleneck, ala Steve Jobs. So Andy thought it'd be funny to call me Steve. But it's still Dave.

DavidTO

So Ric, I have a couple of questions:

It doesn't look like the IPTC keywords that I had on my RAW files (sidecar files) gets carried across. That's kind of a pain.

Also, the DNG output looks different to me than the JPEG. What do you know about that?

lynnesite

Ric Grupe wrote:

I should note, this was done to a JPEG......so don't think DxO is for RAW only.

Dramatic example! re JPG, Put it in Expert Controls mode, and evaluate it with a JPEG and RAW. You lose most of the optical correction tweaks with JPGs including lens softness in the sharpen tab and almost everything in the Optics tab.

wxwax

DavidTO wrote:

It is very good. The second shot I put in was shot at 10mm, but no, there's no buildings there. You can read more about the distortion corrections here.

Yeah, I've seen their site. If you ever play with it yourself, let us know, I'm interested.

wxwax

DavidTO wrote:

Sid,

Why don't you download the demo? It's good for 21 days...you can test it out to your heart's content.

When you buy it you buy access to all the modules available for the package that you've purchased---but you don't download all of them. You only download the ones that you need. I got the 20D, 50 1.8, 50 1.4, 10-22, 17-40, 70-200 and it was 32MB. I may go back and get the Rebel for my older shots, but I didn't do that yet. I can always go back and get the others...as long as they're included in the package I bought (I didn't get the elite version, so I couldn't get the 1 series modules, for instance...)

Good idea. I'm usually pretty reluctant to download stuff, I like to keep the machine as clean as possible. I may make an exception.

wxwax

DavidTO wrote:

Great example, Ric. That should satisfy wxwax!

This is the one I'd test it on!

DavidTO

wxwax wrote:

This is the one I'd test it on!

Let's see it! What camera/lens did you use? Have you checked that they're supported?

One thing of note re: your buildings question: DxO does not support keystone correction. But having said that, it would be easier to correct for keystone in PS after getting all the other distortions out of the shot first, I would think.

DavidTO

Remember, Sid, that DxO has to be first in the workflow for it to have maximum benefit, so hopefully you've got the original RAW file...

wxwax

DavidTO wrote:

Let's see it! What camera/lens did you use? Have you checked that they're supported?

One thing of note re: your buildings question: DxO does not support keystone correction. But having said that, it would be easier to correct for keystone in PS after getting all the other distortions out of the shot first, I would think.

5D, 15mm fisheye.

wxwax

DavidTO wrote:

Remember, Sid, that DxO has to be first in the workflow for it to have maximum benefit, so hopefully you've got the original RAW file...

Always.

R Johns

DavidTO wrote:

DxO Optics Pro review is here.

Discuss.

David,

Great review. I own DXO starter, myself. I love it!

Two observations; first (on page two, pic at the ocean) it almost seems as if CR is doing a better job of controlling lense distortion. Secondly, I don't believe that RAW is supported, for digicams, in any package [excerpt - Elite: (full JPEG and RAW support for all cameras) at $299.] .

Response from DXO, concerning RAW support, for digicams;

DXO - "Unfortunately, given our limited resources, we have no plans at present to support RAW for the following digicams (*they will have JPEG support only*) included in the Starter Kit that was released in late December 2005."

DXO - "A primary reason we are offering the Starter Edition at such a throw-away price is to persuade manufacturers, through the JPEG results, to take steps to embed the software in their cameras so that their customers might benefit. If they do, I'd expect that RAW would be handled."

Bummer...:cry

Again, great review, and thanks for the info!

Regards...

Russ

DavidTO

R Johns wrote:

David,

Great review. I own DXO starter, myself. I love it!

Two observations; first (on page two, pic at the ocean) it almost seems as if CR is doing a better job of controlling lense distortion.

I couldn't disagree more, on that point. Looks to me like the DxO version has removed a piece of gauze from the lens-much clearer, to my eye.

Secondly, I don't believe that RAW is supported, for digicams, in any package [excerpt - Elite: (full JPEG and RAW support for all cameras) at $299.] .

True, I'll review my review to make sure that I'm clear on that point. Thanks!

R Johns

DavidTO wrote:

I couldn't disagree more, on that point. Looks to me like the DxO version has removed a piece of gauze from the lens-much clearer, to my eye.

No, not the clarity. I agree with you, on that. I meant the "Barrel" distortion.

Could just be me, I don't actually have a reference point, for that image.

Regards...

Russ

DavidTO

R Johns wrote:

DavidTO wrote:

I couldn't disagree more, on that point. Looks to me like the DxO version has removed a piece of gauze from the lens-much clearer, to my eye.

No, not the clarity. I agree with you, on that. I meant the "Barrel" distortion.

Could just be me, I don't actually have a reference point, for that image.

Regards...

Russ

Ah. Well, that could be debatable, I suppose, although I think the DxO is better. The thing about that image, though, is that my camera (20D) doesn't report the focusing distance, so that has to be set by hand. And since I did that shot fully auto, it is possible that DxO could have done a better job if I had put in that info. Which is usually, almost always, a guess for me, but I guess better than nothing! I'm not clear on which cameras report focusing distance--anyone know? Or know where they specify that?

DavidTO

So in my review I just pitted automatic settings against automatic. I just wanted to see how the different converters worked on their own.

So, being curious, I asked Andy to supply a shot that he would convert in ACR and I would convert in DxO. He did one conversion, and was allowed to anything at all that he wanted to in the conversion. I did 3. In the first I just used the automatic settings (which use the white balance as shot). The second I used the gray eyedropper to set the color and told the application what the focusing distance was. In the third I played with the image and didn't limit myself at all, like Andy did with his one conversion.

So I learned a couple of things. First, the operator makes a huge difference. Andy has a lot more experience and is more talented than me in doing conversions, and he was working on software that he's very familiar with. I'm much more of a novice when it comes to this stuff, and I was working in software that was new to me.

The second thing I learned is that I have no doubt that DxO handles distortion much better, and that details in the shots are much clearer, but this may not always be desirable. As you'll see below, the DxO conversion (at least the way I did it) is not very forgiving of wrinkles. DxO breaks the image up into smaller chunks and spends a lot of it's processing power working on localized contrast, maximizing the tonal range in all areas of the image. Could be good, could be bad.

So, in any case, here's the results of the shoot out. The gallery is here, and I'll link key images here.

DxO automatic:


DxO that I played with and used whatever functions I wanted to:


Andy's ACR conversion:



Toggle the two conversions:


And here's some toggles of details:

wxwax

I think DxO automatic did the best job with Steve's face and hat, hands down. The colors look right, skin tone seems perfect. But at the same time, the rest of the shot isn't very appealing. Almost blown out, very harsh. (Screw you, Shay! )

Andy's conversion is much more attractive for the rest of the shot.

I agree with you, David. It's all about the operator's eye and talent.

DavidTO

wxwax wrote:

I think DxO automatic did the best job with Steve's face and hat, hands down. The colors look right, skin tone seems perfect. But at the same time, the rest of the shot isn't very appealing. Almost blown out, very harsh. (Screw you, Shay! )

Andy's conversion is much more attractive for the rest of the shot.

I agree with you, David. It's all about the operator's eye and talent.

Definitely about the operator's eye and talent. I guess if you like the ACR conversion you could use DxO to only do the optic stuff, save a DNG and then do the rest of the work in ACR, but that'd be a lot of work.

I had a hard time with the sky, which is part of the reason you're saying it's harsh, I think? Aside from the sky, I find the fields and the rest of the shot better in DxO, but maybe you disagree.

wxwax

The sky, and also the dirt. Andy's warmer take smoothed it out.

As I said, what's appealing to me about DxO is how the automatic mode nailed the skin tones and the hat.

Frankly, given the time of day the shot was made, the rest of the DxO automatic is accurate, just not aesthetically pleasing.